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1Sahil Badruddin = ""Considering how effortlessly religious dogma has become intertwined with political ideology since
September 11, how can we overcome the clash-of-monotheisms mentality that has so deeply entrenched
itself in the modern world? Clearly, education and tolerance are essential. But what is most desperately
needed is not so much a better appreciation of our neighbor’s religion as a broader, more complete
understanding of religion itself. Religion, it must be understood, is not faith. Religion is the story of faith. It is an institutionalized
system of symbols and metaphors (read rituals and myths) that provides a common language with which a
community of faith can share with each other their numinous encounter with the Divine Presence. Religion
is concerned not with genuine history, but with sacred history, which does not course through time like a
river. Rather, sacred history is like a hallowed tree whose roots dig deep into primordial time and whose
branches weave in and out of genuine history with little concern for the boundaries of space and time.
Indeed, it is precisely at those moments when sacred and genuine history collide that religions are born.
The clash of monotheisms occurs when faith, which is mysterious and ineffable and which eschews all
categorizations, becomes entangled in the gnarled branches of religion."-No god but God, Reza Aslan"